Author's Note: Finally, something more recent to share (though not exactly what I had in mind initially, there shall be more within the week).
Written for the areyougame's community prompts on Dreamwidth, prompt: Lightning/Hope: partnership - take my hand and swear you won't let go
I'm an idiot.
Pulse was firm beneath her feet, the grass soft against the back of her thighs where she stood. Despite the pattern of stability this foreign place seemed to offer, the world still blurred no matter how hard she stared out at the vista, unblinking, uncooperative.
Maybe it was the fact that the wind was something fierce, tugging at her scalp and sending blasts of balmy air against her face, that it was another reminder that she'd once had her eyes closed to this sight, shut tight against Pulse's truth, against Snow's words that she'd been blinded by her own idiocy to see reality for how it really was—and not in shades of gray.
Certainly, she knew the path before her was the right one, but it didn't really matter if Serah wasn't there to witness it. It was her fault for locking her sister out of her life, and now, standing amidst the land that had started it all—self-pity was trying to cripple her. It was ironic, because she'd been crippled by life long ago, and apparently changing her identity hadn't been enough for the world.
Old wounds didn't mend—only faded. And hers just simply wouldn't let go.
She heard him before she saw him, but Hope's appearance was still startling. He was quieter than before, but sturdier—and when his hand slipped into hers, small and warm and brimming with a nervousness not unlike him, she discovered it was just as frail as Serah's had been—before she'd been swallowed whole by crystal.
Of all the reminders I get, it had to be Hope.
He settled in beside her, standing awkwardly, slightly hesitant in his endeavors to invade on her space any more than they both knew he had, and Lightning was reminded once again that she was once shy, too. That she was his age once. That luck comes in twos and not ones and that soldiers aren't supposed to cry. That weaknesses should always be exploited.
"Light? We're—we're partners now... right?" he asks, and she's hardly forgotten. Not when the memory's as fresh as it and the wounds feel jagged and the winds are howling up the canyons of the Faultwarrens.
"We're partners, alright," she confirms, and feels pride when her voice doesn't shake, like days past when she was younger, and as insecure as he.
"Is it... would it be alright if I—could I keep you safe?" he stutters out, and Lightning's lips twitch lightly. "I won't let go—I can promise you that," he murmurs, cheeks more than likely red, and Lightning is hit with the realization that it's hard to deny him again.
She knew the familiar feeling of being blocked out—she knew the feeling of blocking people out—and it was both a lonely and ultimately destructive path to take. But he was offering her a solution—an answer, and it was hard to say no when he upturned his face to analyze hers, resolve forming in his eyes, and she realized that she wasn't even allowed a say in the matter.
"We're partners," he reaffirms again, more confidently—and affectionately, because she can, she flicks his forehead, like before when he was one who was collapsing and not she.
"I'm okay with that," she answers, and finds that despite it all, she truly is.